Category Archives: Uncategorized

Incunabulum

Tonight we’re addressing Christmas cards. After thirty-plus years, we have the routine down. John does his people, and I do mine and I can’t tell you exactly how we know whose names are whose. I rely on my old, water-stained … Continue reading →

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Comments on Cosby

  Don’t read the comments. This is an important rule of modern media life. The comments following online articles, reviews, and even YouTube videos can be so hateful, so downright moronic as to obliterate not only your faith in humanity but … Continue reading →

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Bill Cosby: Lost, Stolen, or Strayed

A couple of months ago, my sisters and I cleaned out the attic of my mom’s old house, unearthing precious mementos amidst the junk. My treasures included my old Bill Cosby records, which I had thought lost. There they were, invaluable … Continue reading →

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“Pride” in Noble Acts

  The new movie Pride is what my husband calls, with a hint of irony, a crowd-pleaser. A crowd-pleaser usually contrives not to challenge or surprise the audience but to make them smile and even pander to their world view. … Continue reading →

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R-E-S-P-E-C-T

An avid reader, my dad was a thoughtful, liberal sort. He opposed the war in Vietnam before I did, and he supported the Civil Rights Movement ahead of most white people I knew. Despite his enlightened ways, though, he was … Continue reading →

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Connecting

I’ve written here before about my dad’s experiences at the Rusk Institute of Rehabilitation Medicine in New York City. Brush-Moore Newspapers, the company that owned the Canton Repository, where my dad worked, sent him to the Institute a number of … Continue reading →

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A Dog, Ovid, and Poetry

Prologue Sometimes things connect. I find this frequently in my teaching life, my reading life, and my life life. Suddenly lots of themes and ideas keep recurring. I can’t connect the dots among the areas I’m about to describe. I’ll … Continue reading →

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Happy Valentine’s Day, Frederic Wheelock!

I am a teacher blessed with terrific students. It has not always been so.  Through many years, I sometimes struggled with unkind, arrogant students, annoying ones, and lazy ones. I’ve had extremely unpleasant encounters with parents. I’ve been accused of … Continue reading →

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Joe Update

I wrote about my GED student Joe back in November, when I recounted our travails in trying to get him some extra time for the test, due to a learning disability originally diagnosed when he was nineteen. We weren’t able … Continue reading →

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Neither Rain, Nor Sleet, Nor Snow

Here in Ohio we’re in the midst of an arctic vortex (they’re calling it), producing temperatures far colder than we’re accustomed to. It was around 10 degrees below zero most of yesterday. Schools and workplaces, including my husband’s, are closed … Continue reading →

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